Accused Killer’s Relatives Say He Is a Tragic Victim

Joseph Lynch, accused of killing his wife and infant daughter with a champagne bottle 2 weeks ago, is a victim in a family tragedy, not a murderer, according to his brother, who traveled from West Germany to be with him.

John Lynch also said his brother’s psychiatrist, who was treating Joseph Lynch for manic-depression, is partially to blame for the events of Jan. 17. “My brother is the most nonviolent man I know and he’s ill and he needs help, not punishment,” John Lynch said.

Had the psychiatrist been able to see Joseph Lynch when he and his wife called for help, Joseph Lynch’s wife might still be alive today, John Lynch said.

Instead, police found Helen Lynch bludgeoned to death in the couple’s Santa Ana home. Their 13-month-old daughter, Natalie, in her mother’s arms, was also critically injured by blows to the skull with the champagne bottle. The infant died at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana 2 days later.

When Joseph Lynch was brought before Municipal Judge James P. Gray on Friday morning to enter a plea in connection with two counts of murder, John Lynch and Joseph Lynch’s sister, Mary Shard, sat in a back row and looked at him through moist eyes. But they smiled when he waved, and they waved back.

Brief Hearing in Court

In a brief hearing in the Santa Ana courtroom, Gray gave Joseph Lynch until Feb. 24 to enter a plea. Lynch’s attorney wanted the time to enable his client to undergo a psychological evaluation.

Afterward, Mary Shard and John Lynch said their brother should have received help from his psychiatrist as soon as he sought it.

The day before she was killed, Helen Lynch called the office of Dr. Richard S. Rose, the psychiatrist, to make an appointment because the symptoms of her husband’s manic-depression were again apparent, Rose has said. He could not be reached for comment Friday.

Joseph Lynch was given an appointment for the next day, but his brother and sister said they wonder why he wasn’t seen right away.

Earlier this week, Rose and the family acknowledged that Joseph Lynch was hospitalized for mental problems more than 2 years ago, and had been on lithium for his illness until recently.

“I would like to know why a doctor who’s treating a patient for manic-depression for 2 years doesn’t have time to see him within 24 hours, and in those 24 hours, things happened,” John Lynch said. “I can’t help but think that if he had seen him those 24 hours, we wouldn’t be here and Helen would be.”

Rose said on Wednesday that a secretary, who took Helen Lynch’s call, did not notice any urgency in her voice, and therefore Lynch was given an appointment for the next day.

“I don’t know if Helen made it sound urgent, but Helen wasn’t a pushy sort of person,” John Lynch said.

“And when the appointment wasn’t kept on Tuesday, why didn’t anybody bother to find out why?” Mary Shard asked.

“This is a tragedy,” John Lynch said. “There are three victims here. My brother Joe is not a murderer, he’s a victim.”

Relatives Life Abroad

Joseph Lynch is from Scotland and his wife was from Australia. The family had lived in Santa Ana for 4 years. Most of their relatives live abroad, John Lynch said.

Their parents, who are in their 70s, live in a tiny village near Dundee in Scotland, and the mother recently suffered a heart attack.

“I broke the news to them,” Shard said. “They found it very difficult to believe, to come to terms with any of this at all.”

Two other brothers live in England, but John Lynch said he and his sister were chosen to come to Santa Ana because “we may be the strongest in the family, though I didn’t feel very strong today, I’ll tell you.”

“Mary’s practical. The most important thing is to protect my mom and dad,” he said.

John Lynch, a musician and singer, and Shard, a schoolteacher, arrived in Santa Ana on Sunday, and have visited their brother twice in Orange County Jail, where he is being held without bail. They said that in their visits, they let him do most of the talking. They said he spoke about “everything, mostly about the family.”

Not Act of Malice

Shard and John Lynch do not deny that their brother may have struck the blows that ended the lives of his wife and child, but they said they will never believe it was an act of malice.

“He knows that his body was there the night that it happened, but the entity which is my brother, that wasn’t there,” John Lynch said. “This wasn’t a case of a man angry with his wife and having a fight. This was a case of two intelligent people who loved each other and were calling for help.

“He tried to make an appointment, he and Helen together,” John Lynch said.

Shard and John Lynch said they saw their brother and his family every few years, when Joseph Lynch had to go to England for his work and could manage to bring Helen and the children with him.

“He had a nervous breakdown 2 years ago, which he explained . . . to us as exhaustion from overwork, which we are just finding out now was something very different,” Lynch said. “He called me and said things to me which at the time I thought were out of character for him.”

John Lynch said his younger brother had the reputation in the family of being the hard worker, the one who always did things right. John Lynch was the opposite.

“He was always telling me I should change, well, not drink too much,” John Lynch said. “When he called (at that time), he said, ‘You were right after all.’ He said that maybe the way I lived was not so bad after all. The fact that he said I was right in anything was out of character.”

Will Return Home

The brother and sister, who have been staying with friends of Joseph and Helen Lynch in Santa Ana, say they will return to their homes Feb. 5, but will be back for the trial.

As awkward as the situation has been for everyone, they said their brother’s friends and neighbors have tried to make them feel better. And they say that is a sign of their brother’s character.

“Anybody who knows him would know it was impossible for him to hurt another person, not his wife and kids. That’s impossible for a man like Joe,” John Lynch said.

The Lynches’ church, First Presbyterian Church of Santa Ana, has set up a fund to help the family, especially the couple’s two surviving children, Holly, 9, and Angela, 5.

So far, said the Rev. Mike Pulsifer, the fund has collected $1,700, and offers of help continue to come in. The Tustin division of Crosfield Electronics, where Lynch worked, has told Pulsifer that employees are contributing to help the children. A spokeswoman for the company said both the Tustin division and the home office in Glen Rock, N.J., have organized efforts to help the family.

The brother and sister said nothing has been decided about what will happen to the two children, who are now in the temporary custody of their maternal grandmother, Joan Stuart, who traveled here from Australia last week. Stuart and the Lynches have said there will be no disputes between them over what will happen to the girls.

“Joan Stuart loves my brother like a son and still does,” John said. “She said that to me. And for the mother of the victim, if you want to call her that, to tell you that, I think that’s a hard thing and that means more than anything in this situation.

“There are no skeletons in Joe’s closet. The truth is his only and his best defense.”